This nebula, embedded in the Milky Way at the north end of Cygnus, appears to have cleared a path through the stars. That is not possible. A more reasonable explanation is that, at about 4,000 light years away, it is closer to us than most of the stars and it has an associated dust cloud that is obscuring stars behind. The dust cloud is one of many "dark nebulae" catalogued by Barnard and this is B168.

Here is a crop from another exposure showing more detail of the emission/reflection nebula itself: